@craftkiller any chance we can get a top down picture of the area with a little bit more surrounding area to figure out what they were fixing with those three capacitors?
Would enable me to trace the signals to the connected components and figure out why that hack is or was necessary.
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Absolutely! I haven’t finished threadlocker bluing my hinge screws yet so its all just sitting open on my desk still. Heres two overhead shots, lmk if you need different/better shots. The black squares are where I blacked out the wifi card’s label.
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Forgive my ignorance of laptop mass production, even after being here a few years I’m still learning things. Seeing a hotfix like that not only in the pictures we provided but also this model we sent out, was apparently not expected (which was why it was not originally caught in the first laptops we sent out).
We are looking into this right now to see what’s going on.
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Thanks I’ll try to get the parts from the markings on the chips and figure out what is what first, then I’ll try to follow the tracks.
My initial guess would be something with the power management of the USB port, doesn’t seem to be connected to the Ethernet port further down.
What does threadblocker bluing the hinge screws do?
I’ve marked some obvious components in the picture.
It seems like the board got an possible additional USB port available that is not populated, would probably need to be mounted from the other side.
I’d guess the red circle is the SMPS(Switch Mode Power Supply) for the populated USB port with the coil and the two FETs. alternatively the Chip marked IC outside of the red circle could drive that SMPS for the USB port. maybe they just needed those capacitors to keep the SMPS from ringing to much.
If I find those changes on my Laptop as well I’ll try and probe around a bit figuring out what is what.
Initial searches on the net didn’t turn up much useful info about the components.
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@Kyle_Rankin to be productive here, and not being accused of being negative:
Fact of fix being put is not a problem. Design flaws happens…
The problem is quality of that fix. this solder in picture is done totally wrong. it’s dangerous to the end user.
We are talking about mobile device, that can be exposed to vibrations, shakes ,etc… that is one factor.
Second factor is 
This is done against any rules of soldering microelectronics.
those capacitors should be stacked first, then soldered into one biggest solder point available, then connected with wire into smaller one, both capacitors and wire should be protected with adhesive - there are special UV hardened adhesives for such jobs.
same here.
We are not talking about DYI electronic done in basement, we are talking about 1500USD laptop…
That’s the reason of fact that i altered my order resigned from indirection and bought 3 year warranty.
I still believe in Purism, and with Your mission. I hope that till May when my unit will be sent to me your team will learn how to solder stuff 
Other wise i will sent you a tutorial based on my laptop
Enjoy the Beer @Kyle_Rankin 
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its a non-permanent adhesive that you put on screws to keep them in-place / reduce the chance of them loosening from vibrations. The hinge and case screws of the librem 14 come already threadlocker blued, so you’d only want/need to reapply it if you opened your laptop or disconnected the hinge.
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How do you know they are capacitors? They might as well be cheap chinese spy chips 
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actually good point!
we are Paranoids!
@Kyle_Rankin - prepare support teams for mails like:
hey guys, received my laptop… someone tampered with the board…
Look - spy chips!!!
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I’m not sure folks won’t want this to be rectified in the initial board build and not as a after hot fix that looks like this? And maybe this option should be given to them?
In other words wait until this problem is straightened out in the board design and construction? I’m not sure I wouldn’t be willing to wait a little longer to have it done correctly?
But then I’m no computer engineer builder myself, but it doesn’t sound like the folks here that are more experienced think very highly of what was done here, especially for this kind of money, and after ordering 9 months ago.
Also, and again if this is a dumb question forgive me, but is it actually possible for the folks that are more experienced here to ascertain from the pictures what exactly is going on and what potential problems may arise from what was done? And possible solutions?
Otherwise it seems like reboxing and sending get back to Purism to await a board replacement is the only solution?
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smh
No words can suffice.
Remember, the sales guy is going to say it is not a flaw, it is a “feature”.
I’m surprised this isn’t blowing up a thread yet on reddit and other forum lol
Oh it has come up as part of another thread - similar to what happened here:
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Well, I’m not gonna lie here when I say I’ll wait for the 4th version of Librem 14. Probably this post will be shut down soon for “innapropriate” comments.
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Yep, they don’t sound very impressed, to put it lightly lol. But, what is worse, is the added negative public opinion growing because of this that will continue to spread unless Purism acts in a favorable manner to the customer base. It’s crucial that Purism fix this ASAP and honestly, I’d rather have my board fixed properly, if not a clean production board with this “whatever it is” rectified correctly, and wait another month or two than this.
Hopefully it wasn’t a case of Purism now rushing things, and gave the staff a quickie lesson in soldering, then everyone take a dozen or two laptops and let’s all have a soldering party!
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I’m betting that’s exactly what happened. It seemed strange to me that Rankin kept saying that Purism staff members would have to work overtime just to prep and ship out a few laptops. You’d think that this wouldn’t be that big of a deal. But if they are ripping apart each unit and soldering on a ton of extra components to work around some kind of design flaw, that totally explains those statements.
At this point, as a Purism ex-customer I’m less mad than I am disappointed. Best of luck to those of you who put your hard earned money towards these laptops. If you haven’t taken delivery yet my suggestion would be to ask Purism for a refund as these sort of antics should absolutely be met with a unified front of customer skepticism and refusal to participate.
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I agree with you.
Purism must at least make a post/thread adressing the problem we are seeing here. At least to assure their customers who have been waiting for months. Idk how to feel after waiting for so long (ik, the pandemic etc) just to be met with those capacitors staring at me.
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It’s been 4 days and without a good answer I’m becoming increasingly concerned
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